Thursday, April 26, 2007

This is the third in a series of recipes taken from The Homebrewer's Recipe Guide.

"This easy recipe is typical of the traditional sharp-flavored British porters. While the process is quite simple, the flavors are anything but. This is a very good recipe for the beginning brewer, with results that are sure to impress"

Ingredients

6 2/3 pounds amber malt extract

1 1/2 pounds Alexander's amber malt extract

1/2 pound black patent malt

1/2 pound crystal malt (60L)

1 teaspoon gypsum

1 1/2 ounces Kent Goldings hops (bittering)

1/2 ounce Liberty hops (aroma)

1 package English ale yeast

3/4 cup corn sugar for priming

Procedure

Place crushed black patent and crystal malt in water and steep at 155 degrees for 30 minutes.

Cut fresh apricots in half, remove pits and cut the fruit into quarters. Put the fruit in the fermenter and cover with sugar. Mix 1/2 gallon of water with the honey in a suacepan and bring to a boil. Skim off the foam. When no more foam rises to the top, add the chopped apricots to the honey mixture and pour over the fresh apricots. Add the lemon juice, lemon tannin, yeast nutrient, pectic enzyme and Campden tablet to the mixture. Let stand for 24 hours.

Add the yeast and let the mixture ferment for one week, stirring daily. Remove the solids and pour the liquid into an airlocked fermentation vessel. Let ferment for one month. Rack again and let ferment for two months. Rack again then bottle, cork and cellar the wine.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

This is the first in the series of recipes from Making Wild Wines and Meads.

"The color is light, but the flavor is redolent of the tropics. Choose a ripe pineapple, one that will release a leaf of its topknot with a firm tug--or give the pineapple the sniff test. The flavor--and ultimately the bouquet of your wine--will be reflected in the aroma of the pineapple, you use"

Yield 1 Gallon

4 pounds ripe pineapple

1 tablespoon light brown sugar

4 ounces golden raisins, chopped

2 pounds orang-blossom honey

12 ounces ornage juice concentrate

juice of 1 lemon

1 teaspoon orange zest

1/4 teaspoon tannin

1 teaspoon yeast nutrient

1 teaspoon pectic enzyme

1 Campden tablet

1 package wine yeast

Chop and core the pineapple, and transfer to a 2 gallon plastic bucket. Add the sugar and raisins, and set aside.

In a medium saucepan, mix the honey in 1/2 gallon of water and bring to a boil. Skim off foam. When no more foam rises to the top, pour the honey-water mixture over the pineapple mixture. Add the orange juice, lemon juice, orange zest, tannin, yeast nutrient, pectic enzyme and Campden tablet. Let stand for 24 hours.

Add the yeast and let the mixture ferment for one week, stirring daily. Remove the solids. Pour th eliquid into an airlocked fermentation vessel and let ferment for 1 month. Rack again and let ferment for two months. Rack again. When fermentation is complete bottle.

Tuesday, April 03, 2007

Wyeast or white Labs Saison yeast (or culture your own from the dregs of a good

bottle-conditioned Saison).

/>Method:

Heat6 gallons of brewing water (use two pots if necessary). Stir in maltextract into the brewing water until dissolved and boil for 70 minutes,adding hops and sugar as indicated. Cool to 80 degrees and pitch yeaststarter. Aerate thoroughly. Ferment at 80 degrees to 88 degrees. O.G. = 1.072.